KECOLLECTIONS, 1855-61. 43 



government to send ammunition, troops and all kinds 

 of supplies to Sebastapol ; that they only found a small 

 steamer overloaded that would take my box and to have 

 it stowed near the engine-room that which accounts for 

 the snuff I got and that which also explains you my 

 "purse hurt'* by the Crimean War. Now, will all 

 this long rigmarole story or stories pay you for the 

 candles you will burn for reading them, if you say yes ! 

 I will be satisfied, but I have not done with the transac- 

 tion, although I did not give it up, for, from that time I 

 began to import from France, Belgium, England ; I had 

 awful bad luck, still I persisted. Some plants I imported 

 three times before I could get one alive ; of Latania 

 rubra, Phwnicophorium Scchellarum, Pandamus re- 

 nexus, I think I spent $100 before I could get any alive. 

 Pandamus reflexus was the worst but when I had it I did 

 well with it, because I could propagate it, but the Palms 

 I could not, so when I sold them I had to ask a large 

 price what made some of my friends of the element say : 

 that I charged awful prices ; it may have been so, but if 

 to-day I had nothing to live but what I realized on those 

 plants I could not have one meal every day. I could not 

 very well tell how I have made what we have, nothing 

 in particular ; but on many I always kept a little of every 

 thing in the line of horticulture, so I could supply al- 

 most any thing wanted during the Secession War. It 

 was the Golden Age in every way making money, 



